Harebrained為什么是沒腦子
[ 2009-05-11 15:13 ]
我們平時(shí)說某人行為做事很愚蠢,可能會(huì)用“沒腦子”或者說某人的腦子是某種動(dòng)物的腦子,總之,就不是正常的human brain。在英語里,他們把“愚蠢的”行為稱為harebrained(野兔腦子),估計(jì)跟咱們說的“豬腦子”意思差不多。至于后來為什么演變成hairbrained,看了下面的解釋就明白了。
The first use of harebrained dates to 1548. The spelling hairbrained also has a long history, going back to the 1500s when hair was a variant spelling of hare. The hair variant was preserved in Scotland into the 18th century, and as a result it is impossible to tell exactly when people began writing hairbrained in the belief that the word means "having a hair-sized brain" rather than "with no more sense than a hare."
Harebrained的用法最初見于1548年。而hairbrained這個(gè)拼法也有很長的歷史,可以追溯到16世紀(jì),那時(shí)候hair是hare的另一種拼法。蘇格蘭一直將hairbrained這個(gè)拼法保留到18世紀(jì),因此,人們到底從什么時(shí)候開始使用hairbrained,意即“頭發(fā)絲那么細(xì)的腦子”,來取代原本表示“跟野兔一樣沒腦子”的harebrained也就無從考證了。
While hairbrained continues to be used, it should be avoided in favor of harebrained which has been established as the correct spelling.
雖然hairbrained還在繼續(xù)使用,但是,既然harebrained是最初的正確拼法,我們就應(yīng)該避免這種混淆使用的情況。
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